http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122384809131226907.html?mod=googlenews_wsj# OCTOBER 13, 2008 Is the Pope's Newspaper Catholic? With New Editor, It's Broader Than Ever Retooled Vatican Daily Covers Market Crisis, Extraterrestrials; More Photos, Says Pontiff By STACY MEICHTRY VATICAN CITY -- The newspaper industry might be on the ropes, but one staid broadsheet is getting a makeover at the behest of a lofty patron: Pope Benedict XVI. In its 147 years as the Vatican's newspaper of record, L'Osservatore Romano has rarely chased advertisers, or even news. Hard to find beyond the world's smallest state, the Vatican's daily paper largely dedicated its pages to theological monologues with headlines like "The Leprosy of Sin." Those days are over. Now, the Vatican mouthpiece has orders to carry hard-hitting news, international stories and more articles by women. L' Osservatore Romano The Vatican's newspaper of record, L'Osservatore Romano, has been undergoing a makeover at the behest of Pope Benedict XVI. "There was a really precise request from the paper's publisher," Giovanni Maria Vian, the paper's new editor in chief, said in a recent interview at his office within the medieval walls of Vatican City. "In this case, the publisher just happened to be the pope." A church historian and longtime journalist, Mr. Vian was tapped by Pope Benedict a year ago to make the sleepy, parochial paper a bit more worldly. In recent weeks, the Vatican daily has been giving somber, blow-by-blow accounts of the international financial crisis. Few topics are deemed too bizarre or mundane. In May, L'Osservatore ran an interview with the Vatican's top astronomer. "If we consider earthly creatures as 'brother' and 'sister,' why cannot we also speak of an 'extraterrestrial brother'?" mused Father José Gabriel Funes, director of the Vatican Observatory. Pressed on whether heaven might be open to such beings, the Rev. Funes said: "Jesus has been incarnated once, for everyone." Read Along Take a look at a L'Osservatore front page from 2001, and Saturday's post-overhaul front page. A month later the paper counterattacked the international media for speculating that the pontiff's preferred ruby-red loafers were made by Prada, insinuating he had a taste for material goods. In an article, Spanish novelist Juan Mañuel de Prada -- no relation to the Italian fashion house -- wrote: "The pope does not wear Prada, but Christ." Mr. Vian says Pope Benedict grants him considerable editorial independence, most of the time. Stories about countries that have troubled relations with the Vatican, such as China, are vetted by the Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, says Mr. Vian. Then there are the pontiff's personal requests. During a meeting between Pope Benedict and Mr. Vian soon after the editor was hired, the conversation turned to layout. "He looked at me and said, 'Perhaps the pages could use an extra photo or two,'" Mr. Vian recalls. "Well, we now have more photos." On a recent morning, Mr. Vian directed coverage of a Vatican synod, a world-wide meeting of bishops, from his office. On one wall hung a poster of French comic-book hero Tin Tin, the death-defying journalist. On another was a portrait of Pope Benedict and a crucifix. Speaking as reporters, including one nun, floated in and out of his office, Mr. Vian concedes that L'Osservatore's overhaul has left some readers "a bit disoriented." But he believes that others had long been calling for a shake-up. Founded in 1861, L'Osservatore Romano has served as a mouthpiece of Vatican news, reporting the daily routines of popes and providing ample space for their writings, often in Latin. It was also considered a clearing house for semiofficial thinking on touchy issues such as birth control and women in the clergy. The broadsheet has long drawn criticism, often from within the highest ranks of the church. In 1961, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini, then the Archbishop of Milan, penned a stinging critique of the paper and published it on L'Osservatore's 100th anniversary. "Even when the headline page is not in Latin, one cannot always say that it provides enjoyable reading," wrote Cardinal Montini, who later became Pope Paul VI. "A serious newspaper, a grave newspaper, but who would ever read it on the tram or at the bar, who would ever strike up a discussion about it?" The decades that followed were ones of steady decline. The paper bled readers by the tens of thousands; its daily edition, published in Italian and sold for €1 on newsstands, currently has a circulation of about 15,000. Advertisers all but disappeared. The sole ad in a recent edition announced that the southern Italian town of Brindisi was delaying the hiring of a contractor to upgrade computer systems at the local public-health department. Mr. Vian's appointment as the paper's first new editor in chief in more than two decades is a renaissance and a homecoming. He grew up in the shadow of St. Peter's Basilica. His father ran the Vatican library and counted Pope Paul VI among his friends. Mr. Vian began writing for the Italian Catholic daily Avvenire at the age of 21, though he was working toward a Ph.D. in philology. Poring over the ancient manuscripts of St. Athanasius of Alexandria, Mr. Vian says, was excellent training for the news business. "Reporting that is worthy of being called journalism always relies on the strength of sources," he says. Among L'Osservatore's 100 or so reporters, editors and administrative staff, Mr. Vian is known as "the professor." As the new editor began playing with the paper's layout, he elicited protests from its graphic designers. Black-and-white photos of the pope's daily routines were now off-limits on the front page. Mr. Vian prefers color photos, fewer banner headlines and more stately typefaces. In his quest to expand readership, while keeping to his annual budget of € 4.5 million (about $6.1 million), Mr. Vian has cut back on free subscriptions. He recently struck a deal with a northern Italian newspaper to include L'Osservatore as a Sunday insert. So far, response to the revamp has been mixed. Lucia Annunziata, the well-known host of a television news talk show, says the paper has become a "must-read." Father Juan Diego Chavez, a 33-year-old priest who lives in Rome, called the changes "pleasant," though he says he still prefers to get his nontheological news from other papers. Still, stories that fall beyond Vatican walls are fair game, Mr. Vian says. In a recent front-page editorial, the Vatican mouthpiece put a biblical spin on the financial crisis. "Money disappears. It is nothing. We see this now with the collapse of big banks," the editorial quoted Pope Benedict as saying. "He who builds his life on material success...builds on top of sand." —Davide Berretta contributed to this article. --

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